The quest for a more perfect union
Iowans for LIFE honors the legacy of the 4th of July. Two-hundred and forty-four years may have passed since the Founders signed the Declaration of Independence, but the issues at stake remain relevant and contested.
The pro-life movement embraces Thomas Jefferson’s soaring rhetoric with relish, for a single sentence provides the moral underpinnings to the pro-life movement. It is our nation’s Creed:
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
What makes America unique
The great English wit and intellect, G.K. Chesterton said it is this Creed that makes American unique:
“America is the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed. That creed is set forth with dogmatic and even theological lucidity in the Declaration of Independence; perhaps the only piece of practical politics that is also theoretical politics and also great literature. It enunciates that all men are equal in their claim to justice, that governments exist to give them that justice, and that their authority is for that reason just.”
Human abortion is an obscene rebuke of our majestic Creed in much the same way that human slavery was in the early years of our Republic. Ironically, the two parties who fought over the issue of slavery continue to fight over the issue of slavery today, but in a different form.
Modern slavery
The abolitionists of yesteryear are the pro-lifers of today; while the supporters of slavery yesteryear are the supporters of the slavery of abortion today.
The first president of the pro-life party issued an Emancipation Proclamation to free the slaves. This president labored tirelessly to pass the 13th Amendment of the Constitution of the United States, which once and for all abolished human slavery. Watch this clip from the iconic film, “Lincoln,” where a member of the Slavery/Abortion party asserts that the 13th Amendment should never be passed because:
“Congress must never declare equal those whom God created unequal.”
To this day, his party retains this repugnant belief as it relates to our unborn brothers and sisters.
Watch this dramatic reenactment from “Lincoln”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wd-_ygxZoeU
The Amendment passed. Every member of Abolitionist/Pro-Life party voted for it in the Senate; only two of the Slavery/Abortion party did. In the House, all (86) of the Abolitionist/Pro-Life party voted for the Amendment compared to but 14 of the Slavery/Abortion party.
While Congress battled over the abolition of slavery in our Constitution, General Ulysses S. Grant, a member of the Abolitionist/Pro-Life Party, led the war effort to free the slaves. When the bloody conflict had ended, over 600,000 men lay dead, the slaves freed.
And for his efforts, President Lincoln took a bullet in the brain.
We’re a work in progress
The preamble of our Constitution doesn’t pretend ours is an unblemished nation. Rather, it humbly aspires to create a “more perfect union”:
“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.”
We’re a work in progress, always striving to create a more perfect union, which means all must be allowed to enjoy the blessings of liberties, not just select groups determined by a cadre of the elite. As Reverend Martin Luther King so eloquently stated,
“When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.”
Human abortion reneges on this promissory note today, just as slavery did yesterday.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964
Our quest for a more perfect union continued unabated for another century, reaching a climax with the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, passed with bipartisan support. Seventy-six percent of the Abolitionist/Pro-Life Party voted in favor of the bill in the House, and 81% in the Senate.
Sixty percent of the Slavery/Abortion party voted for the bill in the House and 68% in the Senate.
In this season of unrest, when Lincoln and Grant are once again under attack, Iowans for LIFE honors their great legacy, a legacy defined by their commitment to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.
Knowing their repugnance of human slavery, we have no doubt they’d be on the side of the angels in today’s political battles.
Martin Luther King shows us the way
No nation every achieves perfection. But America made a vow to continue to pursue a more perfect union. How do we do this? How do we fight back against an entire political party and a powerful media, entertainment, and academic industrial complex all aligned against us? Reverend King shows us the timeless path:
“But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.”
Happy Independence Day. And may God Bless America!